OpenAI · OpenAI Privacy Policy · View original document ↗

AI Model Training on Conversation Data (Default Opt-In)

High severity Unique · 0 of 343 platforms
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Recent governance activity OpenAI recorded 32 documented changes in the last 30 days.
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Document Record

What it is

OpenAI uses your chat conversations to train its AI by default. You have to actively go into your settings and turn this off yourself.

This analysis describes what OpenAI's agreement states, permits, or reserves. It does not constitute a legal determination about enforceability. Regulatory applicability and practical outcomes may vary by jurisdiction, enforcement context, and individual circumstances. Read our methodology

ConductAtlas Analysis

Why it matters (compliance & governance perspective)

The clause establishes a default data usage practice where user content contributes to model development operations, with an opt-out mechanism available rather than an opt-in requirement. This structure makes content training participation the operational default unless affirmatively disabled.

Recent Activity

This document changed recently

Medium Jun 12, 2026

The updated policy removes language describing how OpenAI uses advertiser and data partner information to personalize ads and measure ad effectiveness. The policy also removes the specific mechanism Free and Go users previously had to control ad personalization through account settings. In exchange, the policy adds explicit authorization for OpenAI to identify which of a user's contacts use OpenAI services and to monitor all content submitted on the platform for fraud and misuse detection. The authorization to monitor content and identify contacts now appears in the main policy purposes section rather than in supplementary documentation. You can review the Korea Addendum if you are located in South Korea to understand region-specific privacy rules.

View change record →
Medium Jun 9, 2026

The updated policy removes language that previously described ad personalization controls available to Free and Go users through account settings, though the policy continues to authorize OpenAI to personalize ads and measure their effectiveness for these user tiers. Previously, the policy explicitly stated that 'For Free and Go users, you can use the advertising controls in your account settings to control what data we use to personalize the ads we show you on our Services.' This language is no longer present in the updated version. The policy still lists ad personalization as an authorized use of personal data for Free and Go users, but no longer explicitly describes how users can access controls to manage this practice. You should verify whether advertising controls remain functional in your OpenAI account settings, as the policy no longer explicitly references them.

View change record →
Medium May 27, 2026

The updated policy removes specific language stating that OpenAI receives advertiser data to personalize ads shown to Free and Go users. It also removes reference to account-level advertising controls previously described in account settings. These removals are replaced with broader language authorizing OpenAI to promote products through direct marketing and third-party properties, subject to choices and controls, but the terms no longer explicitly describe what advertiser data is collected, from whom, or how to manage it at the account level. The policy now requires users to follow a 'learn more' link to understand ad personalization controls, rather than documenting those controls directly in the privacy policy.

View change record →

Clause Stability Stable

0
Changes
3
Months Monitored
Apr 27, 2026
First Seen
Apr 27, 2026
Last Seen
This clause type exists across 261 other provisions on other platforms.

Consumer impact (what this means for users)

Your chat conversations, including potentially sensitive personal information, are used by default to train OpenAI's AI models unless you manually opt out via account settings, placing the burden of privacy protection on the user rather than the company.

What you can do

⚠️ These actions may provide transparency or partial mitigation but may not fully address the underlying issue. Effectiveness varies by jurisdiction and individual circumstances.
  • Opt Out of Arbitration
    Log into ChatGPT, click your profile icon, go to Settings, select Data Controls, and toggle off 'Improve the model for everyone' to opt out of conversation data being used for AI training.

How other platforms handle this

Windsurf Medium

We may use your Autocomplete User Content to improve our discriminative machine learning models, which are models that rank or assign scores to code generations in order to understand the boundaries between different sets of code. We will never use your Autocomplete User Content to improve generativ...

Mistral AI Medium

Data publicly available on the Internet. Our artificial intelligence models are trained on data that is publicly available on the Internet by third parties, which may contain personal data, even if we use good practices to filter out such personal data. [...] Training Datasets. In some cases, we acc...

DeepL Medium

To improve the quality of our services, we analyse texts submitted for translation. We ensure that this analysis cannot be traced back to individual users by anonymising the data before analysis. DeepL Pro subscribers' texts are not used to train our machine translation systems.

See all platforms with this clause type →

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▸ View Original Clause Language DOCUMENT RECORD
"
We use Personal Information to train, evaluate, and improve our models and Services, including to train models used to provide our Services. We may use your Content to improve model accuracy, safety, and capabilities. You can opt out of having your Content used to train our models by visiting your account settings.

— Excerpt from OpenAI's OpenAI Privacy Policy

ConductAtlas Analysis

Institutional analysis (Compliance & governance intelligence)

(1) REGULATORY FRAMEWORK: This provision implicates CCPA/CPRA Cal. Civ. Code §1798.121 (right to limit use of sensitive personal information), §1798.120 (right to opt-out of sale/sharing); FTC Act Section 5 (15 U.S.C. §45) regarding adequacy of consumer disclosure; state comprehensive privacy laws (Virginia VCDPA §59.1-578, Colorado CPA §6-1-1306) regarding consent for secondary use of personal data; and potentially HIPAA 45 CFR §164.502 if any health information is inadvertently disclosed in chat. The California Privacy Protection Agency and FTC are primary enforcement authorities. (2)

Full compliance analysis

Regulatory citations, enforcement risk, and due diligence action items.

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Applicable agencies

  • FTC
    The FTC has jurisdiction over unfair or deceptive data practices under Section 5 of the FTC Act, including default opt-in schemes for secondary use of personal data without adequate consumer disclosure.
    File a complaint →
  • State AG
    California, Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, and Texas AGs enforce state comprehensive privacy laws that regulate secondary use of personal data and require meaningful opt-out mechanisms.
    File a complaint →

Applicable regulations

EU AI Act
European Union
California AB 2013 AI Training Data Transparency
US-CA
Colorado AI Act
US-CO
EU AI Act - High Risk Provisions
EU
GDPR
European Union
Texas AI Act
Texas, USA
Trump Executive Order on AI Policy Framework
US
UK GDPR
United Kingdom

Provision details

Document information
Document
OpenAI Privacy Policy
Entity
OpenAI
Document last updated
May 5, 2026
Tracking information
First tracked
April 27, 2026
Last verified
April 27, 2026
Record ID
CA-P-003156
Document ID
CA-D-00010
Evidence Provenance
Source URL
Wayback Machine
Content hash (SHA-256)
8d0fc75b2591d6a033bfeb50a1e7b57bb62cb682a52fcbbd714621617a7525af
Analysis generated
April 27, 2026 09:30 UTC
Methodology
Evidence
✓ Snapshot stored   ✓ Hash verified
Citation Record
Entity: OpenAI
Document: OpenAI Privacy Policy
Record ID: CA-P-003156
Captured: 2026-04-27 09:30:04 UTC
SHA-256: 8d0fc75b2591d6a0…
URL: https://conductatlas.com/platform/openai/openai-privacy-policy/ai-model-training-on-conversation-data-default-opt-in/
Accessed: June 17, 2026
Permanent archival reference. Stable identifier suitable for legal filings, compliance documentation, and research citation.
Classification
Severity
High
Categories

Other risks in this policy

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Built from archived source documents, structured governance mappings, and historical version tracking.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does OpenAI's AI Model Training on Conversation Data (Default Opt-In) clause do?

The clause establishes a default data usage practice where user content contributes to model development operations, with an opt-out mechanism available rather than an opt-in requirement. This structure makes content training participation the operational default unless affirmatively disabled.

How does this clause affect you?

Your chat conversations, including potentially sensitive personal information, are used by default to train OpenAI's AI models unless you manually opt out via account settings, placing the burden of privacy protection on the user rather than the company.

Is ConductAtlas affiliated with OpenAI?

No. ConductAtlas is an independent monitoring service. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by OpenAI.